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Monday, August 31, 2015

Hood to (Almost) Coast 2015

Nothing like an epic relay adventure to feel the need to try and breathe some life back into this poor old blog...

Over the weekend I had the opportunity to run the 2015 version of the oldest relay in the country, Hood to Coast. This was my second time participating in this relay, the first time waaaaaaay back in 2011. (If you have all day to spend reading about my adventures, feel free to click HERE.) In case you don't know how HTC works, it's 197 miles from Mt. Hood to Seaside and it is split up between 12 runners, 6 in each van. This year, I was in van 2 and runner #10 "with a twist". I ran leg 10, leg 22 and instead of leg 34, I switched with our #11 runner and ran leg 35... this gave me a little bit more mileage and our #11 runner a little bit of a mileage break which she welcomed as a somewhat less experienced runner. Technically, that is against the rules, but we weren't exactly a competitive team so we weren't too concerned about bending the rules a bit. So, onto the report...

Our team came to be because an old friend of my BRF, Heather, "bought a team" from a group that couldn't do it. In an attempt to fill the 12 spots, Heather was given carte blanche to fill Van 2. After a little juggling, and few last minute switches, we ended up with:

L to R: Marissa, Me, Heather, Christi, Chris, Jeff

Heather "Hill-Walking Cry Baby #1", Marissa "Just Along for the Food", Christi "The Tortoise", her husband Chris "The Hare", Jeff (a man we had never met) "Stranger Danger", and me "Hill-Walking Cry Baby #2". Our team name was Running for Decades (because between the 12 of us our birth dates ranged from 1950-80 (would've been 90's too but we lost our highschoolers to strict cross country coach regulations)).

PC: Christi

We were a pretty slow inexperienced group so we got a nice and early start time of 5:45am. Luckily, being in Van 2, we didn't have to be at the start and therefore didn't even need to leave Eugene until around 7am to have plenty of time to meet up with and take over for Van 1. After an uneventful drive up I-5 we pulled into Sandy and found them pretty quickly and it was good that we had time to spare because they were running 30 minutes ahead of schedule. Pretty soon we were on the clock and running our legs and it was HOT! It was hard to complain about the heat, however, because we knew going into the night and Saturday, there was nothing but cooler temps, rain and lots of wind in the forecast.

My first leg, #10, was completely along the Springwater Trail in Gresham. It was roughly 5 1/2miles and relatively flat. While I was waiting for Heather to come in and hand off to me the clouds rolled in and I was blessed with an overcast run...although a still pretty toasty 81 degrees at 1:30pm. I've been doing a lot of mileage lately with zero speedwork so I wasn't sure what my legs could give me when it came to trying to run fast. I knew that I wanted to try to make them go though. The last time I did HTC I also got to run along the Springwater Trail but it was dark and I was seriously alone for the whole thing. This was a much different story...there were people everywhere and much to my surprise, people a fair amount slower than me and I just kept on passing them (roadkills) and it felt great! Before too long, I was into the exchange and handing off to Christi.

Stats: Leg #10, 1:36pm, 5.54 miles, 41:57, roughly 7:35 pace, Roadkills 23!!
After that leg, it was back into the van to cheer on Christi...

She was a good sport waiting at a stoplight while we drove by.

and then her husband Chris...

They both killed it and then we passed off to Van 1 and headed to a local house for dinner and showers and little naps. Awesome!!

Naps and resting went too quickly of course and before we knew it we were rushing to meet up with Van 1 and get back to our running.

Although feeling a little sore and groggy, I was exited for my second leg. I love running in the middle of the night. There is something kind of magical about it. Also, my leg had a nice climb to start out for the first mile+ but then was downhill all the way to the exchange. I loved every second of it! I wasn't sure if it would really be completely downhill though so I was a bit conservative going up the hill but then I crested it and then I flew. It was dark and a bit rainy and I was wearing a sparkly skirt and there was a little creek running sporadically along the road and I felt amazing! Well, that isn't entirely true, my quads started protesting a bit early on, but I politely ignored them and pressed forward passing runner after runner (while offering joyful encouragement) on my way to the exchange. The runners, in return, were pretty jovial, one guy said "nice job man...uh I mean lady" (as I passed him in my sparklyness) and another guy asked what the speed limit was. It was a lot of fun. Although, my paces this year were nowhere near the last time I did it, I was still happy to see some numbers starting with 7.

A pretty decent progression run.

Stats: Leg #22, 12:52am, 6.7 miles, 52:25, roughly 7:41 average, Roadkills 27!!
Somewhere between when I stopped running and our last runner started so did the rain and the wind and the thunder and lightning. By the time we handed back over to Van 1 it was really coming down and we were soaked. Luckily we were able to call it a night and find some shelter in Tent City:

Although the tents were a little bit leaky and some of our neighbors were extremely loud, Heather, Marissa and I had a great time, camping it up in the middle of a pretty raging thunderstorm. Poor Van 1 was out there running in it...again, it was good to be in Van 2. I was pretty hyped up and didn't think I'd be able to get much sleep, but I did manage to doze for a while and it was surprisingly refreshing.

Up until that point, everything had gone pretty smoothly. Leaving that double exchange, however, proved somewhat difficult. It took us 30 minutes just to get out of the parking lot! Then we were racing the clock to meet up with Van 1 who we had no contact with and could only assume were still running ahead of schedule...almost a whole hour at that point. We would've made it too but as we rounded the last corner for the van exchange, traffic came to a stop and did. not. move. We sat and sat and sat and sat and finally convinced Jeff that he should hop out and run an extra mile into the exchange zone to take over for the van 1 runner. Good thing he did... she had to wait 30+ minutes after coming in to hand off to him. :(

Apparently the hold up was due to the crazy wind and rain. Some race officials were going van to van to let everyone know that the rest of the race was going to be left up to our discretion and that if we felt conditions were too unsafe to continue, we could pack up and drive the rest of the way to Seaside. What?!!!! Not to mention the fact that the way they announced it caused a huge delay and made us way late to the exchange but there was no way we were going to quit. Well, there was a small amount of consideration but ultimately we determined ourselves not to be quitters and opted to press forward.

They were not joking about the wind however. It was coming at us from every direction. I was amazed at our runners though. Each in turn, they powered through, and around tree debris, and did an awesome job with it. When it came to my turn, I was just walking into the exchange hoping to hit up the portapotty when I saw Christi coming across the bridge. I ran to the front of the bathroom line said, "my runner is on the bridge! Can I jump in really fast?!!" Luckily they let me take cuts and I was in and out just in time to hear Christi say, "where is my runner?!". I said, here I am, handed her my jacket and took off up the hill.

The wind was brutal. It was constant with huge gusts that made you stumble. It was so hard to run in it was almost comical. In fact I may have laughed out loud at one point but it didn't matter because no one could hear me. Had the wind stopped, I literally would've fallen flat on my face. I was really glad that we decided to keep going though and finish. I think we all would've been disappointed had we just driven to the coast. I didn't really love my last leg. I'm not a very big fan of running in the wind. I'm also not a stranger to it, as I spent my first 3 years of high school running in the Columbia Gorge...you just have to kind of lean into it and push forward. As for the route, it was on a mixture of gravel and paved patches and a large portion of it was just straight albeit gradually uphill. I don't much care for running on gravel either. I gave it most everything I had left though and managed to pass other people...a lot of other people. 47 runners to be exact (I didn't count the walkers). It was like a death march out there. I ended up averaging 8:40ish and I had to work hard for that.

Stats: Leg #35, 12:50pm, 6.94 miles, 1:00, 8:36 average pace, Roadkills 47!
I handed off to Chris and then we jumped into the van to meet him and Van 1 at the finish. We weren't really sure what we were going to find when we got there. There was rumor that the finish line was closed and that they moved it into the basement of the Shilo Inn. The only thing we knew for sure was that we were going to finish one way or another. Here is what we saw when we got to the beach:

It kind of looked like some post apocalyptic world.

Sadly, this is the closest we got to the real finish line.

We didn't have to wait long for Chris and then it was a short jaunt down the boardwalk where Van 1 jumped in to join us as we happily made it across the impromptu finish line. Our official finish time: 32:51:29. Not too fast, but just fast enough. ;)

Van 1 had been hanging around for a while and with the finish line festivities mostly non-existant they were quite anxious to be on their way. We did take an unofficial team picture, but I didn't manage to get a copy...you'll just have to imagine that there was another van involved.

Overall, I had a lot of fun this time around. Everyone in our van stayed in good spirits and worked hard...I think it was a great group of people. I would definitely be interested in running it again.

Really, the thing that made the whole weekend worth while, however, was the selfie I managed to snatch with Sasquatch...what more could a girl ask for?!

Oh, and here's what the news people had to say...complete with some nice video evidence of what we experienced.

1 comment:

Sounds like you guys got it bad! I'd like the later start Van 2 got, but the weather was something else. I am really glad I got the rain and not the wind, since that is SO taxing. Your sasquatch pic is priceless!!

OC&E State Trail

A little about me...

I'm a mother of five and obsessed with running. I'm married to a great guy who is willing to support and even encourage my running habits. We're happy to be be living in Eugene were there are an abundance of tracks and trails to run on. Go Ducks!